A Brush with the Devil

Sam Moore worked his way through college selling Bibles door-to-door, tried banking, and returned to selling Bibles. Moore built a salesforce and branched out beyond Nashville, Tennessee. Then he began to publish Bibles himself and took his company public. In 1969, Moore bought out UK Bible publisher Thomas Nelson & Sons' US operations for $2.6 million and renamed the company Thomas Nelson Inc. It became the world's largest Bible publishing concern. In 1990, the company earned $4.3 million on revenues of $74 million. Moore had a brush with the devil in the 1980s when he made a brief foray into printing. After acquiring a bindery, printing press, and publisher, Nelson lost $5.4 million on revenues of $72 million. Debt ballooned and shares fell. Moore sold the new acquisitions and returned to his practice of contracting printing business out. By 1988, profits were growing, and Moore branched out into Christian music cassettes and gift items. In 1990, Nelson's revenues from gifts and music items totaled $8 million.